An odd silence

By Adam Wisnieski

Posted
1/24/13

An odd silence

After a long court battle, Democrat Cecilia Tkaczyk was last week declared the winner of Senate District 46 by 19 votes over Republican George Amedore. This means that the 63-member state Senate is made up of a majority, 33, registered Democrats. So you’d think there’d be overwhelming pressure on Mr. Klein from Democrats to rejoin the conference he left in 2011. But not really.

Aside from some grumbling by Democratic constituents and one letter to the editor by Jack Marth in this week’s Press, we haven’t heard anyone crying loudly from within Mr. Klein’s district or nearby. State Sen. Gustavo Rivera has said repeatedly that Mr. Klein should rejoin the conference, but the only Democratic senator who seems to be out there crying foul is Rev. state Sen. Ruben Diaz Sr. And he’s calling out Democrats for not making more noise about this.

In Mr. Diaz’s “What You Should Know” column on Tuesday, he takes Rev. Al Sharpton as well as state Democratic leaders and unions to task for not speaking out against the power sharing agreement.

“There has not been one labor demonstration, and not even one protest by any of the great Democratic community leaders in New York against this atrocity,” Mr. Diaz wrote. “By all indications, they have given up and quietly accepted the shift in power away from the Democratic Party and toward the Republican Party. The only lonely voice crying out in the wilderness appears to be mine.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, I have a few questions for all of those New York’s great leaders: Have you given up? Where are the demonstrations? Where are all of the real leaders of the Democratic Party?” Mr. Diaz wrote.

Perhaps Mr. Klein helping to push through new gun laws took some of the pressure off. According to a recent Siena poll, even a majority of registered Democrats approve of the power sharing agreement. (See story below.)

In support of Klein

According to a recent Siena poll, 73 percent of 676 registered voters in New York state have no idea who state Sen. Jeff Klein is, but 54 percent of those voters think the new power-sharing agreement he made with Senate Republicans is a good thing.